Surprise: Steven Spielberg’s ‘Lincoln’ To Premiere Monday At New York Film Festival

EXCLUSIVE: One of the fun parts of the New York Film Festival is the surprise films that show up unannounced. We are hearing that the festival will stage the World Premiere ofLincoln, the Steven Spielberg-directed film that stars Daniel Day-Lewis as the 16th President in the final months of his life and his struggle to end the Civil War, reunite the country and abolish slavery. Tony Kushner wrote the script.

The DreamWorks film made a splash last night with a two-minute trailer that was shown immediately following the first Presidential debate between Barack Obama and Republican candidate Mitt Romney. NYFF last year surprised festgoers with a premiere of the in-progress Martin Scorsese-directed Hugo, a film that went on to garner a swarm of Oscar nominations including Best Picture. It’s a showy way to put a film in the Oscar conversation. DreamWorks would not confirm this is happening, but dress for it! Here’s the trailer that premiered last night: